TRAINING CHILDREN TO BECOME THIEVES.

Thames Star, Volume IX, Issue 3054, 28 November 1878, Page 1

TRAINING CHILDREN TO BECOME THIEVES.

It is distressing to know, says the London Daily Telegraph, that the detest* able task of training young children to become common thieves, as practised in the days of "Oliver Twist," is still continued. At Southwark Police Court there were lately brought up two wretched, little girls, Kate Davey, aged nine, and Margaret Wood, aged seven, charged with stealing purses containing money from a number of females in the public streets, and from shops in Kent street, in the neighborhood of the Borough. James Leonard, aged twenty-eight, and Betsy Goodwin, " a&ed twenty, were also charged with inciting these deplorable youngsters to commit robberies and with receiving the plunder. A detective saw the two children enter a shop in Kent Street while a lady was being derved. The elder eirl of nine acted as "front stall," standing before the victim; the child of seven was " back stall," and picked the lady's pocket of her parse. From what the tiny malefactors said when apprehended, the elder and real criminals, Leonard and Goodwin, were taken into custody aod several empty purses were found in their possession. The confession made by Margaret Wood, aged seven, to a woman who had been locked up in the same cell with her was touching* in its simplicity. "You should have seen me steal the purse," said the wretched urchin; it would have made you laugh." " The first parse I took in the morning," continued the candid footpad of seven "contained two half-sovereigns and' some silver. I took that easily and gave it to Goodwin. She only gave me a shilling." She added that

she had taken a good many purses, and that Leonard and Goodwin followed her confederate about and got drunk with the money. , Both these miserable children had mothers, who attended in Court, and made lame excuses for not having their daughters under efficient control. The case was remanded, the children being sent to workhouse.